Michelle Teheux: I'm going to have to ask you to calm down

Michelle Teheux

Wednesday

Mar 31, 2010 at 12:01 AMMar 31, 2010 at 7:51 AM

Whenever I really get on a roll, my teenager can usually turn my rant into laughter by saying, in his best cop-like tones, “Ma’am, I’m going to have to ask you to calm down.” For all you folks who can’t stop panicking at the health care bill, I have this to say: “Folks, I’m going to have to ask you to calm down.”

Whenever I really get on a roll, my teenager can usually turn my rant into laughter by saying, in his best cop-like tones, “Ma’am, I’m going to have to ask you to calm down.”

For all you folks who can’t stop panicking at the health care bill, I have this to say: “Folks, I’m going to have to ask you to calm down.”

Government involvement in health care is nothing new. Heard of Medicare? Heard of Medicaid? Shall we go on?

What do you think happens right now when somebody without health insurance ends up in an emergency room? That’s right, that person gets patched up in some fashion, and who pays for it? Correct, fellow insurance holders. We do.

We eat the cost of patching up those who are too poor to afford health insurance, and we eat the cost of patching up those who could well afford it but who have chosen for whatever reason not to buy insurance, thus sticking the rest of us with the cost of their folly. That shouldn’t happen under the new system.

Since we’re already all helping to pay for health care for those who are uninsured, either through our taxes or through our higher insurance premiums, I’m all for anything that can better organize this whole mess and provide better primary care, instead of uninsured folks just utilizing the ER.

The health care bill is not perfect. In my opinion, it suffers from too many cooks spoiling the broth by each insisting his or her own pet ingredient be slipped into the pot. To carry the metaphor a bit further along, the pot-stirrers throwing red herrings into the pot didn’t do us any favors.

But no matter. At least we’ve made progress, and perhaps the next batch will be better.

No system will ever be perfect. But our traditional system was among the worst. In many areas we have the world’s best medical technology, yet we have much worse health outcomes than the rest of the developed world in many key categories, such as infant mortality.

We were the last industrialized country to come to this party, so it’s worth looking around and seeing how the various plans have worked out for others.

In Europe, there are several different versions of national health care. Each country has come up with a slightly different way to try to deliver care to all its people. By and large, Europeans are happy with their care. In my non-scientific sampling of my husband’s European relatives and friends, those living in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany all are satisfied with their systems. Nobody would trade in their health care for what we’ve had over here.

Now that the thing is passed, let’s cut out the tantrums and theatrics. Drink your tea in peace, if you please, whether this new health care plan is your cup of tea or not.

You can stop shrieking about death panels and other such nonsense. (My question to my husband early on was, “So, honey, how many of your relatives have you had to euthanize?” He didn’t know whether to be amused or horrified that some people really think that’s a part of a national health care system.)

It’s a new way of doing things — here in America, anyway — and it will solve many problems and probably create a few others. In balance, I think it will be good. In five years, I expect anybody who tries to propose going back to the old system will receive incredulous stares.

The thing I’m most worried about now is whether this bill will provide psychiatric care for those who are more interested in tearing down our country than in gracefully accepting that a big decision didn’t go their way. Stats showed those in favor and those against a health care bill were pretty evenly divided, so somebody had to go home disappointed.

A tough pill to swallow, perhaps, but necessary. And now, if you please, I’m going to have to ask you to calm down.

Michelle Teheux may be reached at mteheux@pekintimes.com.

The views expressed in this column are not necessarily those of the newspaper.

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